Hunters and Demons
by Adder007
Summary: Crossover between Halo and Metroid. Samus gets sent to the halo universe, along with a few other problems.
1. Chapter 1

Aight, I'm gonna try my hand at one of these Halo/Metroid crossovers. It's obvious that master chief and Samus have many similarities, and are both the big gunners for their respective universes. I'm figuring that this actually takes place between halo 1 and 2, since we have no idea what's happening between 2 and 3, and the master chief was still frozen before halo 1. I know, it's not quite cannon with First strike as I was recently informed. Bear with me though...it'll be explained in the end. In terms of the Metroid timeline….I'm figuring after prime 2.

Oh, and I don't own the characters created by Nintendo and Bungie respectively.

* * *

The soldier stood at the edge of the observation deck of the warship, looking out at the vastness of space. In reality, he was lucky to be standing there. While destroying the massive warship on the ring world had been his only choice, he would have preferred to have just a little more room for error. True, it had worked. But if he'd been there just a few seconds longer….he shook his head. Best not to think about that. The point was, it was over. Well, mostly. He'd drifted in space for several weeks before finally being found by a UNSC scout ship. If it had been from the covenant, who knows what would have happened. Granted if they boarded the ship instead of just vaporizing the small fighter he was stranded in, he probably could have done something. 

Yes.

The initial rush of Grunts would be easy to take down, he'd take a plasma pistol from one of them to cut down the shielded elites, and once he'd obtained one of the superior weapons they carried then he'd fight his way to the….

"You're doing it again"

The voice in his head stopped his mental scenario. Behind the opaque visor of his helmet he smirked slightly. "Never hurts to be prepared, Cortana"

"Master Chief, it's over. For now anyways. Why don't you rest? Ever since we were picked up you've been so restless."

"I had plenty of time to in the two weeks we were drifting." He flexed a gauntleted fist. "The covenant is still out there. I should still be fighting instead of standing around here"

The entity known as Cortana would have been shaking her head if she'd had a form right then. Every now and then she almost forgot he was an organic being. Sometimes he acted just like the rest of them, but at other times, he acted just like one of her kind. Always driven towards a purpose, never going past what they were designed for.

"Well. You'll get your chance. The ship is going to start its return pattern in a week. After that it'll take another week to reach Earth. With the war still in full swing, I'm sure they'll find a use for your skills.

* * *

A large cruiser sped through space, firing weapons wildly into its rear arc. Behind it, a small yellow ship dodged the hailstorm of energy bolts. 

At the controls a large figure wearing power armor sat, deftly maneuvering the ship. Among other things, her armor allowed her to directly interface with the ship, allowing her to move it as if it was part of her own body, and react much faster than any other pilot. Her visor displayed a stream of tactical information and gun trajectories, allowing her to dodge each shot before it was even fired.

Samus gritted her teeth. While her Hunter-class gunship was more than adequate under normal circumstances, and ideal places where stealth was preferred, at times like this she wished she had a bigger ship. Under these circumstances, the two opposing forces were at a stalemate. If the larger ship ceased movement, she'd easily be able to dodge the fire from the stationary target and board it. Thus it kept moving, restricting her approach, and with the vastly superior firepower it possessed, it kept her at bay.

It seemed that just when she thought things were over, the space pirates always proved her wrong. Fate always seemed to provide them with a means to disrupt the peace of the galaxy. First it was the Metroids. She thought she put an end to that one when Zebes was destroyed.

Then it was Tallon IV, where somehow the space pirates managed to get a few living metroids off of Zebes and breed them. This of course was complicated by the discovery of phazon. Again, she went in, and after the destruction of metroid prime and the impact crater, she thought it was over.

But then there was Aether. The world was split in two by more phazon, and was now the source of her problems. Even though she seemed to have succeeded in the destruction of the Ing and her dark clone, things still weren't as they should be. Apparently the pirates had managed to salvage some of the portal equipment used to travel between the light and dark side of Aether. Granted, while dark Aether no longer exists, she was pretty sure they'd find some way to abuse the technology for the worse of society.

This of course, was the reason she was speeding after the cruiser. Her ship's advanced sensors had picked up unusual readings from its cargo hold, similar to the ones she'd taken in the portal rooms on Aether. And from what she could tell, this was also the reason it hadn't tried to jump to hyperspace. Readings suggested the portal was interfering with the fabric of space, meaning a jump to faster-than-light speed would be risky at best. In fact it was probably a good thing they hadn't tried…

She frowned, and then cursed. It was if they had read her mind. Scanners showed massive power diverting to the ships hyperdrive. Her eyes widened as she realized that she was way too close. A massive distortion field appeared around the ship. And then something went wrong. The field expanded, collapsed, and then sent out a massive shockwave. It seemed as if a tear had appeared in space, from which blindingly bright light poured out. Samus barely had any time to react as a sudden force slammed into her ship, dragging her along with the pirate vessel into the rift.

* * *

Red lights flashed on the bridge as the suspicions of the crewman at the sensors were confirmed. A covenant ship had been detected nearby. The bridge doors slid open and the Spartan walked in. He towered over almost all present by a good head and shoulders. The green power armor he wore only added to the effect. He walked up to the con where the captain stood, reading all the sensors. He stopped and saluted "Reporting for duty sir." 

The captain turned to the super-soldier at his side. "Master chief…looks like we might need your help here.

"What's the situation" he replied, his voice as calm and business like as ever.

"We've spotted a covenant warship on sensors. Only one. It's about the same size and class as us, but knowing the superior design of covenant warships, we might have a problem. The only question is whether or not they know we're here."

"Hey" the voice in his head said. "Let me have a look…it's getting kind of cramped in here anyways"

The Master chief reached up to a port on the back of his helmet and ejected a small cartridge. He placed it into the appropriate slot in the console next to him. A small purple hologram of a young woman appeared above the console.

"Much better." She said, looking around.

The captain glanced at the console. "I've heard of those A.I's, but I've never seen one before. Interesting."

Cortana rolled her eyes and said "Yeah, nice to meet you too. Any ways. Yes, they know we're here. I've seen covenant ships detect a fighter at twice this distance."

The captain nodded. "Allright. So what do we do?"

Cortana shrugged. "They're faster than we are. If we jump, they'll follow and be waiting for us right as we re-enter. We're going to enter into conflict with them no matter what we do. We might as well do it on our terms."

"Allright" The captain turned to a crewman at his side. "Sound battle stations. We're going to see if we can damage them as much as possible on the first volley to lessen their retaliation. Focus on their gun batteries, we want to weaken them as much as possible. Cortana" he turned to the Hologram. "Figgure out the best approach angle for a ship of that class. Do anything else you think…"

Suddenly another alarm went off. The captain looked up from Cortana. "What now?"

"Captain!" it was the crewman at sensors. "You might want to look at this"

The captain walked over and peered at the sensors readings. "Sir" the crewman stuttered "there's some kind of…rift forming near the covenant ship"

"I could have told him that…" muttered Cortana.

"Is it some kind of new covenant weapon or tactic?" the captain asked.

"Not that I can tell" Cortana spoke up again. "I didn't get any kind of readings from the covenant ship. As a matter of fact…" she frowned. "Captain. Something just came out of the rift. Something big."

"Can you tell what it is, Cortana?" he asked.

"It seems to be some kind of ship. Design unknown. And….it's opened fire."

"The covenant ship? Or the unknown?" the captain was still looking at the sensors

"Both now. I don't recognize the energy signatures of the weapons being used by the unknown." She raised her eyebrows. "Odd."

"What" both the captain and the Master chief asked.

"It seems to have severely damaged the covenant ship…but it's leaving. It also doesn't seem to have noticed us. It's traveling in the opposite direction, but it's not jumping." She looked up at the two. "What do you think?"

The captain thought for a moment, and then said "How badly damaged is the covenant ship. Can they retaliate?"

Cortana shook her head. "No. The unknown ship essentially did exactly what we would have done. By now it's flown out of our sensor range, I can't tell if it sustained damage itself."

The captain nodded, and then turned to the chief. "I think we should investigate. Even if there's nothing unusual, we should raid the ship for supplies. We might even be able to find something for the boys at the R&D department to play with. And regardless of what happens, I think that one less ship for the covenant is a good thing. Based on your report about your actions on halo, I think that destroying a single covenant ship isn't beyond your skills."

The master chief nodded. "One thing though."

"Yes?" the captain asked.

"I need a weapon."


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2. I don't own the characters in this story, Bungie and Nintendo do.

* * *

"Are you sure about this?" Cortana asked.

"Why wouldn't I be?" the master chief replied. The Master Chief was standing at the edge of an open airlock. He held an assault rifle at his side, and a number of grenades were clipped to his belt. Things hadn't turned out quite as ideally as they'd hoped. The unknown ship had done a real number on the covenant warship. Not only had all the weapons been taken out, but the engines were also non-functional. They had left them dead in the water, and had left several gaping holes in various parts of the ship.

Upon scanning the ship, they had realized there was a problem. In the attack, all of the docking ports on the ship had been blasted shut, or were malfunctioning to the point where they wouldn't work. Making it so no one inside could possibly escape. This also meant that it was almost impossible to get in. The fact that the ship had been caught off guard meant it also had no time to launch its transports and fighters, meaning the bays were still full. This prevented access to the hangars via a pelican drop ship. As a matter of fact, nothing much larger than a fighter craft could fit into the hangars with them still being full.

This was why the Master Chief was standing in an open airlock, about to jump out across space and into the hangar bay of the covenant warship. The marines on the ship didn't possess any kind of spacesuits that they could easily get on and off, or that would be combat worthy if things got nasty. So he was the only one going over, until he could figure out a way to give them access.

As the cruiser pulled into position adjacent to the crippled covenant warship, the master chief quickly judged the distance between the two, the amount of push he'd need, and then with a quick kick of his legs off of the back wall of the airlock, sailed across the void between them. He had judged perfectly, and he smoothly passed through the atmospheric shield of the hangar bay and landed on his feet, once again under the constraints of gravity. Automatically his training kicked in and he brought the rifle up to his shoulder in a firing position, ready for anything.

* * *

The hangar bay was a disaster area. Aside from several crates that had fallen over, there were alien bodies everywhere. Bright blue blood was splattered across the deck, pooling under the various elites and grunts that lay unmoving. The master chief did notice a few spatters of fluorescent orange ichor on the walls, but was only halfway surprised not to find the owner in the vicinity. Hunters took a lot of killing. However, whatever had done this clearly had been able to at least survive against them, as he didn't see any corpses that didn't belong to the covenant. That worried him. Not only had the culprits mowed down an entire hangar bay full of covenant troops, but they had survived against a pair of the massive hunters.

He bent down to examine some of the dead, and frowned. The wounds on some of the elites were quite unusual. Based on the number of burns on their skin and armor, the weapon in question was definitely energy based, but was not a plasma weapon. Turning the elite over, he saw that the shield generator built into its armor had overloaded. So the weapon not only had a rapid rate of fire, but also had enough power to cut through an elite energy shield.

He turned to the next corpse and grimaced. It was a grunt, or rather, used to be. The creature had nearly been cut clean in half, but the wound was jagged, clearly indicating some physical force had been involved.

"Cortana" he asked. "Have you ever seen anything like this?"

"No, I haven't. The injuries of that grunt in particular are quite puzzling. Energy blades leave a very clean cut. This one looks like it was physically sliced open. I've never heard of a material blade with that much power behind it."

The Master Chief nodded. "And the elites?"

"That's also unusual. Not nearly enough heat damage for a plasma weapon. The rate of fire that must have taken place would also have overheated any plasma weapon we've seen."

The Master Chief activated his comm. "Captain. Something's not quite right over here. By the looks of it our unknown vessel somehow dispatched boarders. I suggest you hold back on reinforcements for now. I want to check this out a little more."

"Roger that. Be careful"

"Over and out." The Master Chief took one last look around, and then grabbed a plasma pistol and a few grenades off of the ground. He had a feeling he might needing them.

* * *

After discovering the massacre in the hangar bay, he followed the trail of orange blood. It was obvious that the hunters had run into whatever had killed all those covenant, and had engaged in combat with them. If he found the hunters, he would find the source of the problems.

It turned out that he was almost correct. The passageway he followed led to another hangar bay. Upon cautiously entering the room, he found the first of the massive creatures slumped across the ground. The armor across its faceplate was heavily scorched by the same type of weapon that had been used on the elites, and closer inspection showed that one of the many shots had found the vulnerable gap in the armor beneath its "chin".

Upon looking up, two things caught his eye. The first was the second hunter. Apparently whatever had killed its partner had retreated down one of the corridors at the end of the hangar bay. Unfortunately for the hunter, the corridor was too small for its massive bulk. In its berserk rage, it failed to notice this, and had become lodged in the doorway, where it apparently was then finished off. The metal around the edges of the door were buckled around the massive armor plates, testament to the incredible strength of a hunter

The second thing that caught his eye was a small spaceship of unknown design in the hangar bay. It was small enough to fit in the hangar bay, even with the covenant drop ships still present. It was painted orange and gold, and vaguely resembled the face mask of a helmet. He didn't even bother asking Cortana if she'd seen it before. Whatever it was, it clearly wasn't covenant.

He turned away from the strange ship and to the back wall of the hangar. Due to the massive carcass blocking the one doorway, there was no way he'd be able get through there. He did see a smaller tunnel, presumably used by grunts or for maintenance purposes, but he decided he'd prefer not to get lost in the bowels of a ship he'd never been in.

"Cortana. Can you get me the layout of this ship?"

"One step ahead of you" she said. A small orange arrow appeared on the inside of his visor, indicating another door in the hangar. "Take that door. It'll eventually lead to the hallway behind that hunter. Not exactly the most direct route, but we clearly don't have a choice."

Upon walking through the doorway, he almost tripped over the corpse of another elite. Looking down, he noticed something unusual. Based on where his weapons had fallen, the elite had been knocked backwards about 10 feet down the hallway. There was a considerable amount of shrapnel imbedded in the walls where he had been standing, and the walls were slightly scorched. It looked like he'd been hit with a missile of some kind. But who in their right mind would waste a missile on a single elite, when there was a massive hunter in the same room? Unless they had a very large supply to justify unchecked usage of such weapons, it didn't make sense.

The Master Chief shook his head. This was getting stranger by the moment. A horde of covenant soldiers and two hunters taken down by rapid fire energy weapons no one had ever seen, a strange ship, and then someone who would use a weapon designed to take out tanks on a single soldier.

Suddenly he snapped his head up. He'd heard something echo down the hallways. It sounded like a cross between a growl and a hiss. He'd never heard anything like it before. He raised the plasma pistol up to an aiming position, and slowly moved down the hallway and around the corner.

Down the corridor was a crossroads, where the hall split off in 4 different directions. Right as he turned the corner, he spotted someone entering the corridor to the right. What he saw made him stop dead in his tracks.

It was unlike anything he'd ever seen. It stood about as tall as an elite. Shiny black chitin covered most of the creatures body. It was insectoid in nature, yet it had the structure of a humanoid, possessing four limbs and walking upright. Orange eyes glowed out of a wedge shaped armored head. A large weapon of some kind was grafted onto its right arm, and the left forearm sported a large scythe shaped blade. The thing failed to notice him, and continued out of sight.

"Well" Cortana said in his head. "I think we just found out what happened to the covenant."

The Master Chief nodded and slowly moved down the corridor. He heard the clicking of the creature's feet on the metal deck plates, and as he neared the hallway where the creature had turned. As he prepared to round the corner and open fire, the radar on his HUD suddenly detected the presence of something almost directly behind him. He heard the sound of crashing metal as one of the doors in the hallway junction exploded outwards in a hail of metal and smoke, and he whipped around, gun at the ready.


	3. Chapter 3

I don't own the characters, blah blah blah, disclaimer etc.

* * *

The being that strode forward out of the wreckage of the doorway was almost as intimidating as the first creature. While it was slightly shorter than he was, it was obviously meant for battle. It was covered head to toe in shiny armor plating in various shades of orange, yellow and red. Massive rounded pauldrons of shiny orange plating protected the shoulders, and a red helmet with respiratory gear covered the head. The green V-shaped visor set into the helmet offered no clue to the beings identity. While the left arm was relatively normal, the right arm sported a massive cannon which formed the entire fore-arm. 

It glanced at him for a moment, and then looking down the corridor he had been about to enter, it took off at a sprint. The Master Chief barely had time to get to his feet before he heard several shots go off in rapid succession and then the thud of something large hitting the deck.

The Master Chief turned the corner to see the newcomer standing with a boot on the chest of the struggling creature. The weapon on the creature's right arm had crushed beyond recognition, and the creature was vainly trying to hack away at the armored boot planted on his mid-section. Without a word, the armored being placed the muzzle of the cannon up to the creatures face, ending its life with a flash of energy.

"Must have been personal…" muttered Cortana.

* * *

Samus lined up the shot, and flexed her right hand. The charged up missile slammed into the sealed door, reducing it to scrap metal. Striding through the ruined doorway, she momentarily registered the presence of someone who actually appeared to be human before catching sight of the space pirate down the corridor. She sprinted forward, dodging several shots it fired at her before flipping through the air several times and colliding with it. Her right foot drove into it's chest, knocking it to the ground. In the process of landing, her left foot landed on the creatures weapon, crushing it beneath the armored boot. 

She regarded the creature for a moment. Through the green visor covering her face, the space pirate saw a look of utter disgust lacking any pitty. Frantically, it tried to escape, attempting to hack away at her boot with the blade attached to its left arm. However, in this position it couldn't get any leverage to do any kind of damage.

_You're almost not worth the shot. _She thought. She aimed her weapon at the creatures face and pulled the trigger. _Almost._

She was about to continue down the corridor when her audio sensors picked up something behind her. Turning around, she spotted the soldier she'd seen in the hallway. She was momentarily taken aback. Even in her power armor, he was taller than her. Granted, while he was wearing some form of power armor himself, it was obvious that he was about half a foot taller than she, even without it.

Her mental thoughts triggered the scanning system in her visor. After a few moments, a data readout showed up on her HUD, along with a summary.

_Human, Male. __Age__ unknown.__ Abnormally__ tall, __Heavy__ frame. Genetic or cybernetic enhancements suspect. __Power Armor of unknown design.__Possesses energy shield system with limited capacity but rapid recharge ability.__ Armor provides full atmospheric containment and considerable enhancement of physical st__rength. __Tactical software, unknown._

She regarded the soldier. While he held his weapon at the ready, it was not directly aimed at her in a hostile manner. The green armor was not anywhere near as elaborate as hers. Her readouts suggested that it was a lot heavier than hers, but also was a lot more powerful in terms of strength assist capabilities. Granted, it was nowhere near as flexible, and it also didn't contain any built in weapons systems, but she had no doubt he would be a formidable combatant. She stared at the visor. Unlike hers, it was opaque, so she was unable to see the face behind it.

The soldier broke the silence.

"What is that thing?" He asked. The voice was low, cold, and business-like.

She glanced down at the fallen pirate. "Space pirate. Scum. Part of a massive organization dedicated to the sole purpose of bringing about the end of the Galactic Federation and dominating the galaxy at any cost." The speakers in her helmet did nothing to disguise the contempt in her voice.

The soldier stared at the fallen creature for a moment before looking at her. "And you? You're part of this….Federation? You don't match any kind of intelligence we have."

Samus sighed. The fact that he didn't know who she was confirmed her suspicions. Privately she admitted to herself that her ego was just a little injured. She'd built up quite a reputation in the galaxy. Everyone knew who Samus was. The portal had obviously taken her somewhere very different from the galaxy she knew, possibly even to a different time. Well…stranger things had happened before.

"I am a bounty hunter." She answered. "I work for the Galactic Federation, when they chose to hire me. Of course…" she stared into the visor covering his face. "You probably have no idea what I'm talking about"

"You're right. I don't." he said. She noticed that he had gripped his weapon much tighter than before. "Nor do I know what your intentions are, or where you came from, though I'm guessing it has something to do with the rift the pirate ship came out of."

"You'd be guessing right" she replied. "I was more or less dragged into it with them after…unusual circumstances."

"A contract that went wrong then." He raised his gun slightly. "And after the contract is done…then what?"

She noticed the hostile gesture. Muscles in her body tensed, in case she had to get out of the way fast. "I wait for the next contract. What's it to you?"

"Your allegiance goes to whoever pays you, from what I understand." He answered. "This puts me in a very dangerous situation, since I don't know where your loyalties lie."

Samus was just about to reply when she saw a blurry outline appear right behind the soldier. A strange paired blue energy blade appeared in mid-air and pulled back, about to slice him in half.

"GET DOWN!" She yelled, bringing up her arm cannon. As he ducked, she changed the shape of her hand inside the cannon. The gun casing expanded vertically, revealing a glowing white crystal matrix with clouds of condensation surrounding it. A bright white blast of energy flashed out of the muzzle.

Samus glanced at the creature, frozen in mid-slash. The blade was currently occupying the space where the soldier's head had been, the strange horizontal hilt connecting the twin blades frozen into the solidified palm of the creature. She turned to the soldier who was getting to his feet. "Does that answer your question?" she asked, returning her arm cannon to its normal pulse fire mode.

He had gotten to his feet at this point and after glancing at the creature, he turned to her. "So you aren't with the covenant then."

"I don't even know what the covenant is!" she replied, a little irked."I followed a group of the pirates onto this ship. I don't know who this ship belongs to, or even where I am!"

The soldier was silent. He seemed to be reacting to something that she couldn't hear, possibly a com-link in his helmet. Except she wasn't detecting any signals being exchanged between him and somewhere outside. After a few more seconds of silence, she just shook her head and brought up the map of the ship she had been keeping track of. She didn't have time for this. Looking at the map, she frowned. She hadn't been able to find a computer anywhere that would give her a ship layout, so she didn't have much to go on.

However…It looked as if the corridor the soldier had just come down would lead back to the hangar bay she had left her ship in. Glancing at her energy gauge, she decided heading back would be a wise choice. The weapons used by the aliens on this ship used some form of plasma energy. While it wasn't the raw superheated form that her most powerful weapon used, it had still proven quite able in draining the shields built into her suit, leaving her with only half of her tanks still full. Ignoring the soldier and the frozen alien, she walked past them and started down the corridor, her weapon at the ready.

* * *

"I was only being cautious, the last thing we need in this situation is someone who's going to stab us in the back" 

"Well, did you ever think you might have just given her a reason to do just that?" Inside his helmet, Cortana shook her head. "Men…Honestly"

"Well, now there are two more factions on this ship. The bounty hunter, and these pirates. That complicates things. Originally I had thought an allegiance between us and whoever massacred the covenant back in the hangar bay would be beneficial. Now I'm not so sure. The big question is, who's responsible? It's likely that there is a large number of those pirates on board, which makes them the more probable culprit. However, if the bounty hunter is telling the truth and they are as dangerous as she says, they might be more trouble than they're worth.

"And the bounty hunter?" Cortana asked.

"The fact that she doesn't know who the covenant is means she can't be working for them, and the fact that she just attacked one of their soldiers supports that. However, she is a bounty hunter, if they were to offer her enough…that would change things. And there is still the possibility that she is responsible for the dead in the hangar."

"You think she's capable of that?"

"There's a definite chance." He glanced at the frozen Elite. "We don't know what that suit of hers is capable of. If it was her, and not the pirates, then that makes her incredibly dangerous. The fact that she entered solo and is still alive attests to her skill. I suggest we keep an eye on her until we know what she's up to. The last thing we need is a sudden shift of allegiance when we're not looking."

"Agreed." Cortana replied. "Based on the direction she went, that strange ship in the hangar must have been hers. That's probably where she was headed."

The master chief nodded and was just about to head in the same direction when he noticed something. The Elite blinked. It was still alive. Now _that_ was interesting. He sighed. No time to mess around with that now. He pulled a plasma grenade off of his belt and clicked the activation button, before sticking it in the palm of the frozen Elite. He turned and headed down the corridor, stopping only to hit a panel on the wall. A door to slid down between him and the Elite, muffling the explosion that came a few seconds later. With that done, he jogged off in the direction of the hangar bay.


End file.
